Sen. John Kennedy pushed back hard on critics of the Trump administration’s seizures of Venezuelan oil and tankers, arguing that real sanctions require real enforcement and that those actions are hitting Maduro and his criminal network where it hurts.
Senator John Kennedy of Louisiana defended the Trump administration’s seizure of sanctioned Venezuelan oil tankers and laid into Democrats who argue for leniency toward Venezuela’s regime. He told Fox News’ Jason Chaffetz his Democratic colleagues are “skillet heads” and that “Sanctions are worthless unless you enforce the sanctions.” From Kennedy’s point of view, enforcement is the difference between posturing and policy.
“Well, first, Jason, Merry Christmas,” Sen. Kennedy began.
“Congress went straight to hell after you left, and we miss you. In terms of Venezuela, peace is my soulmate. I feel great sympathy for the people of Venezuela. I feel no sympathy for the Venezuelan government, led by Nicolás Maduro.”
And those who do have sympathy for MAduro, I suspect some of my colleagues do, they shouldn’t be driving. They oughta ask for their money back on their GED. Karma is going to eat ’em some day. Look, Venezuelan government isn’t a dictatorship; it’s a criminal organization.
Venezuela and Maduro, to be specific, he makes his money by selling poison to our kids, and to the rest of the world, and by selling illegal oil. And some of my colleagues say, ‘Well he’s not selling fentanyl, he’s selling cocaine,’ like that’s okay. I mean, look, skillethead, what do you think they mix the fentanyl with?
Street dealers don’t walk around saying, ‘Here’s fentanyl, get your fentanyl right here, and it’ll kill you.’ They mix it with the cocaine to give it extra kick. If they put too much of the fentanyl in the cocaine, you die. You’re dead as Jimmy Hoffa. And what the Trump administration has been doing is working. You’ll notice we don’t see any drug boats these days. There’s a reason for that. The cartels and Maduro can’t even find a single person to drive them.
In terms of the tankers, this is illegal oil, being moved in illegal tankers. We have judicial warrants to seize those tankers. Its about time we did it. That oil goes to China, some goes to India, a lot of it goes to Cuba. Cuba gets 40 to 50 percent of its oil from Venezuela. Without that oil, the communist regime in Cuba will eventually fail. I think we ought to choke off Venezuela’s money. We got ’em down. Let’s choke them to death.
On Fox, Jason Chaffetz pressed Kennedy about the legal arguments critics raise, asking whether the administration’s moves ignore due process and international norms. Chaffetz pointed out that many in Congress claim the actions are illegal and that Maduro is still being afforded some protections by those critics.
“Well, we have an illegal president in Maduro,” Chaffetz said. “He’s not even the legitimate leader there. But to hear the Democrats in the United States Senate and in Congress, many of them, not all of them, but many of them, will make the case that this is so wrong, and there is no due process, and what they are doing is illegal. What do you say to those people?”
Here is what I say. Do you remember under President Biden, when he sanctioned Iran, from producing and selling oil? That was just a piece of paper. Sanctions are worthless unless you enforce the sanctions. Now the Trump administration is enforcing the sanctions. Let me say it again. This oil is illegal. It’s sanctioned oil, and it’s being moved on illegal boats, sanctioned boats, flying under a false flag. And they’ve been doing that for a long time. And we didn’t enforce the sanctions. So now we’re doing it, and it is hurting the Maduro regime. Good! I’ll take a dozen of ’em.
Kennedy framed the seizures as blunt but effective statecraft: when you stop the money flows, you starve the kleptocrats and the cartels that feed off them. He pointed to real-world consequences — fewer drug shipments, disrupted revenue streams for Cuba, and pressure on the Maduro network — as proof that enforcement changes behavior.
This is a conservative case for muscle over moralizing: the United States can use its legal tools and naval power to deny illegitimate regimes the proceeds that fund corruption and criminal activity. From that perspective, sanctions that sit on paper are theater; sanctions backed by action are policy that produces results.
Critics will keep arguing about procedure and precedent, and courts will sort many questions out in time, but Kennedy’s message was straightforward: if you want sanctions to mean something, you have to make them mean something. That argument resonates with voters who want borders secured, drugs blocked, and enemies weakened through sustained pressure rather than empty warnings.
Policymakers will face choices about how aggressively to press enforcement and how to handle the legal fallout, but the political case for breaking the revenue lines of hostile regimes is clear to those who see sanctions as tools of leverage rather than mere statements. For Kennedy, that leverage is a necessary part of protecting American interests and allied stability in the region.
